Improving Kerbol System

[coyotesfrontier]

Assuming you worked at SQUAD, how would you improve the Kerbol system, assuming there were no engine or codebase limitations whatsoever? Stuff like giving Vall a subsurface ocean, or having dust storms on Duna that blow your craft around.

[warrior606]

Procedural terrain texture and topology generation (small bumps, not landmark ridges), so planet surfaces look a lot closer to what you see in Martian/Venutian images of their respective surfaces. Or maybe something like a fixed seed that generates really close 3D detail, but in a very small range, vastly improving the landing experience while saving some performance and storage. 

Also solving the whole late gate problem; I don't have a solution but there are a lot of smart people at Squad. Would be nice to have better late game mechanics.

[Gargamel]

Moved to Suggestions. 

[betaking]

I'd simply add some of the planets in the "outer-planets pack", in addition to some more minor planets, and asteroid varieties.

I'd try at least to design a feature that could allow for some "orbital settings" to be selected to the game, so you could have a difficulty setting where, for instance, the Mun's inclination would change if you set it to "hard".

Other than that I'd agree to what Warrior is saying with regards to Procedural surfaces, something like that would be quite good, though you'd want to ensure colliders wouldn't bug out. Improvements in atmospheric/aerodynamic modeling along the lines of FAR wouldn't be something I'd mind either.

 

If performance could be improved enough, then I'd think further work in areas relating to stuff like "wind" might need to be considered, maybe even some basic "weather".

As for Kerbin itself I'd basically just move "Baikerbanur" to the place where Woomerang was set up (N45.29,E136.11), move Woomerang to something like (S34.876099,  E142.174072), maybe a few other "extra launchpads" as well (with their own respective VAB's), and label what was the "Baikerbanur" something else... idk though.

[WelshSteW]

I don't know how detailed you can make the surfaces, but there's basically no difference between deserts, ice caps, tundra etc. other than the colour of the ground. You don't sink into soft ground, you don't slide about on ice...

There are no densely forested areas, no swampy areas... where landing would be a problem.

A cave system or two might be fun, considering how popular the Mohole is. Plus if weather could be simulated, it could serve as a shelter for a base. If wind was a thing you could use it for power generation.

And some running water could be good. You could use it to set up hydroelectric generation for example. A river could sweep away a light rover that tried to cross it...

 

Obviously not all planets will have these types of features, maybe just Kerbin I suppose, but even then at least it's give you a reason to explore your home planet.